Blocking access to social media

[Bunbaker]

DD is in year 11 and has a lot of exams coming up. She seems to be totally incapable of revising without having access social media sites, Putlocker and YouTube.

The problem is that a lot of her revision resources are online. Ideally I would like her to use a laptop, but be able to block access to Facebook, Messenger and YouTube.

I can confiscate her phone and iPad so she can't text, use Snapchat or Instagram, but I can't not let her use the laptop.

Any ideas?

although maybe in some ways I don't get it as of my 3 children 2 were very driven perfectionists who needed to be reminded all the time that their life would not be ruined if they didn't get 12 A*s, and the other was more like OP's daughter

it all works out in the end somehow

Finally some posters who understand.

Or rather, "Finally some posters who agree with me."

"I did GCSEs about 7 years ago, they were the most overrated exams, they've never affected my life much"

A lot has changed in the last 7 years.

There are all sorts of ways to 'control' DC. I wonder how many of the posters who are suggesting you leave her to it truely leave their kids to do as they please. The knowledge your parents will be quietly dissapointed in you can be just as much as a mind fuck than parents that shout and scream.

Isn't choosing to send your child to a school which gives out lots of homework 'controlling' in its own way.

I think that it's not unreasonable to limit your DDs access to social media. Can you try and get her to agree to only using it between certain hours and then you can set up some parental controls to back it up.

It's easy to control access to social media on Apple products - just google Apple parental controls. Your internet provider may also provide parental controls on your home network. I used to use BTs parental controls when my DC were kids. There are also plenty of third party services such as bitdefender and net nanny. I'm not up to date with what's the best thing to use as my DC are adults now.

If you let us know who your internet provider is I'm sure someone can tell you what is best to use.

I'm all for DC learning from their mistakes and I have always been very keen on letting my DC be responsible for their own decisions but GCSEs are important and I don't see anything wrong with a bit of parenting.

But the OP's dd is in year 11, so presumably 16/17. Well able to get around most parental controls which are really intended for young children. My same aged ds could certainly hack our systems (not that we have any controls on them). I also think that for teenagers what is needed is to learn to manage your own time. Having someone do it for you is not necessarily that helpful. Sometimes that needs to be a collaborative affair, but I doubt the OP shutting off access alone will address her not revising.

And yes learning that if you don't work you will fail is a good lesson sometimes, and better to learn that for a relatively unimportant exam than for example your degree.

Oh and my parents were very disappointed with me for not working hard enough for my O levels. And I knew they would be too. Didn't make that much difference when faced with the choice of doing boring work or slacking off though.

DD is 15 nooka. She will be 16 in July.

At 16 GCSE results do matter
They determine what you can study at A level and where
Universities do look at GCSE results these days, especially the Russel group ones

10 or 20 years down the line GCSE results aren't important, but they are for now.

Thank you for all your feedback. I realise that DD does have to learn to manage her time and I won't be blocking social media. However, I do think that some posters under-estimate how important GCSEs are these days.

I had similar issues myself this year Bunbaker. Dd did GCSE's in the summer and it was a nightmare trying to get her to work. I used to take her phone from her at bedtime on school nights but I nearly drove myself crazy nagging her to study, cajoling, bribing, everything I could to encourage her to revise. She did next to nothing at home. However she surprisingly got a very good set of results, which we were very pleased with. I swore that after that I w ould just leave her to get on with things herself. Its hard seeing her doing the same again with AS levels but I don't think she will succeed this time as its a big step up.

She has no idea what she wants to do (nothing realistic anyway) but does not want to go to uni. Time will tell where she ends up.

I understand what you are going through. Its really difficult

I'm not saying that GCSEs don't matter, just that later exams matter more. If you don't learn to how to study it's a life long disadvantage. I have always struggled with revision, didn't really crack it until my masters and under-performed at all levels before that. I really wish I'd learned how to study despite the tediousness of learning stuff I thought I knew much earlier. Still having said that underperforming in my O levels didn't spur me on to work any harder!

Sorry about getting your dd's age wrong Bunbaker. We've left the UK and I'm used to thinking that year 11 is parallel and forgot that children here finish school a year earlier as year 12 is the last year here (thankfully we also have far fewer exams too).

Bun baker, it might still be worth another shot discussing this with your DD and asking her if she wants you to block social media between certain hours.

OH and I are going to sit down with her and ask her to make her own suggestions on how to proceed. At parents evenings the school stress how important it is not to be using social media while revising.

I agree that procrastinators will find any kind of distraction, but I still think it is harder now because there are so many more and it is so easy to succumb.

Last year when DD was revising for mocks (she took 2 GCSEs early) she didn't have many friends and didn't "talk" to anyone on social media. She was much more focussed about revising.

Bun, the big problem with motivation is that it's an internal process so you can't "give" anyone it.

It's really hard, I know, especially ehen you know how important something is and that they can do better.

Yes, you are right RJ

"I'm not saying that GCSEs don't matter, just that later exams matter more."

In the long term you are right, but it is the first step and if she misses that then she misses all the subsequent ones that she wants to take. So at 15/16 they are important. At 25/26 they aren't.

You're right they are important that they open the door to the next stage.

I have the opposite problem, an overly stressed 15yo dd. I've spent a lot of time reassuring her that there is always another way round - if the results don't go your way then you can always find another way to get where you want to be. I don't think you should tell your dd that but please remember it yourself!

And I know, dh and I both left school at 16, he's got a 2:1 honours from a Russell group uni, I've got a masters and several post grads (love studying ) so it's definitely possible, with him leaving school was lack of motivation too.

What I'm saying is don't drive yourself round the bend!

I work at home. Some days I procrastinate on social media not Mumsnet of course, oh no and then do my work in a panic.

It's really, really hard not to waste time on the internet, and I'm a grown up, not a teenager desperate to talk to my friends.

I have a program on my computer called Self Control, which lets me ban myself from some websites and set the amount of time I am banned from them. Once I've set it going, nothing at all will let me access Facebook or MN until the time is up. It's infuriating but it works.

Apparently Freedom does the same thing for PCs.

Can you set these up in conjunction with her, so that she is partly in control of the process?

I suspect part of the problem lies with being academically able; she may not have had to try that hard until now and it's a hard skill to learn from scratch.

Thanks RJ. I have just been upstairs to ask DD what her plans are for today and she has listed all the homewroks and revision she intends to do, so I promised not to nag her.

The thing is she is always full of good intentions and I know she will still be doing some science homework at 10.30 because she has been procrastinating all day. But my lips will remain sealed.

The next issue is getting her to stop using the internet until the early hours of the morning.

If I ban screens in her room after 10.30 we get world war three and criticism on here for not trusting her. I have trusted her in the past and she has broken it so many times.

Well, 7 hours later DD says she has done some maths revision, and she has done 3 lines of a homework that is due in tomorrow. And that is it. She has spent all day on social media.

Grr!

So turn the router of tonight at eight- you have a direct reason too.

DD1 did her GCSEs in the summer.

Although the many posters who say that teens should be able to self regulate may well be right, there will always be a proportion who can't.

So you need to decide - do you want to facilitate her to get the best results she can, or are you willing for her to underachieve (and accept that may affect her 6th form options and possibly university offers).

DD1 had an upstairs laptop for work, and a downstairs one for play.

Upstairs we had parental controls and explicitly blocked various social media sites. It helped our distracable, dyspraxic daughter focus on revision.

In my opinion, many of those people who say let them self regulate, have non-distractable and/or bright DCs. Some other teens need all the help they can get.

Thank youTeen I think you may be right. Clearly leaving DD to do it on her own just isn't working.

DD has just had a meltdown. She says she is depressed and unmotivated. She wants to do well, but can't find it in her to do any work.

She has spent all day looking at what she has to do and then messaging her friends instead. She could easily have completed everything in a couple of hours and then completely switched off. Instead she has it all hanging over her while she procrastinates then gets more depressed about it

She is currently receiving CBT for social anxiety, but feels she can't tell her therapist about this, so I will have to slip her a note. She can't/won't even talk to the learning mentor at school who will have had plenty of experience in dealing with this sort of thing. Unfortunately not being able to reach out to those who are better able to help her than we can is not getting her anywhere.

We have had a discussion and agreed to make a revision/homework timetable so that she can work intensively in short bursts with clear breaks in between. She can tick off everything she has done and hopefully as the ticks get longer she will feel more positive.

I have also told her that there is to be no internet after 10.30 on weeknights.

I unashamedly micro managed DD's revision. She can't organise herself out of a paper bag.

From your update re managing anxiety I think you might need to too.

With each 45/60 minute revision session, we discussed what she would aim to achieve in that time. e.g. Revise p60-64 of Physics, Do 2 French listenings, half a practice English paper or whatever. I also did lots of the science and maths 1-1 with her as I could explain it and it helped her focus.

We agreed what hours she could reasonably work, and stuck to it. It worked well in the Christmas before mocks, and for the final exams. Come results day we were both relieved and delighted; it was worth the effort.

hmmm.. that's a bit of a massive dripfeed about all the mental health stuff.
Oh well, glad you found something that works for you.

I wonder if MN needs an "Ordinary person" topic. For people who aren't dealing with anxiety or ASD SN probably wouldn't ever be anyone but me to post there. At least I'd have fewer excuses than ever to read MN.

I mentioned the social anxiety upthread. She only told me this evening about feeling depressed.

She has cheered up a bit because a couple of her friends are being supportive.

Social anxiety comes with the age and year group....

I agree, massive drip feed. My advice would have been completely different for a child undergoing CBT.

I mentioned the social anxiety upthread SoWhite. DD says that she finds the CBT sessions unhelpful BTW.

How would your advice differ?